Beneficial Effects Of Testing Research Articles

Do partial and distributed tests enhance new learning?

Testing facilitates subsequent learning of new information, a phenomenon known as the forward testing effect. The effect is often investigated in multilist procedures, where studied lists are followed by a retrieval test, or a control task such as restudying, and learning is compared on the final list. In most studies of the effect, tests include all material from the preceding list. We report four experiments, three of which were preregistered, to determine whether tests that are partial (not including all studied items) and distributed (including retrieval of items from earlier lists) are effective in enhancing new learning. The results show that testing of all studied material is not necessary to produce beneficial effects on new learning or to reduce intrusions. The beneficial effects of testing were substantially mediated by reduced proactive interference. Importantly, there was minimal evidence that the forward learning benefits of partial and distributed tests are offset by a cost to untested items via retrieval-induced forgetting. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

Knowing Is Not Half the Battle: the Role of Actual Test Experience in the Forward Testing Effect

Recent studies suggest that testing on prior material enhances subsequent learning of new material. Although such forward testing effect has received extensive empirical support, it is not yet clear how testing facilitates subsequent learning. One possible explanation suggests that interim testing informs learners about the format of an upcoming test and consequently allows them to adopt study strategies in accordance with the anticipated test format. Three experiments investigated whether the beneficial effects of testing are due to learners’ expectation with the test format or due to testing experience itself in inductive learning by varying when and how learners were informed about the format of an upcoming test. The results showed that informing learners about the test format via an interim test, but not a pretest, enhanced subsequent learning (experiment 1), and it was effective only when combined with actual test-taking experience (experiment 2). Testing appeared to enhance subsequent learning of new material when learners had an opportunity to evaluate their mastery over previously studied information. Experiment 3 further showed that these beneficial effects of testing were yielded even in the absence of feedback. Taken together, the findings suggest that mere exposure to the test format, not combined with actual testing, is not sufficient to enhance subsequent learning.

The Positive Effects of Nationwide Testing on Student Achievement in a Low-Stakes System

This article examines the implementation of a set of compulsory IT-based, self-scored, and adaptive nationwide tests in a low-stakes accountability system. We exploit exogenous variation resulting from students voluntarily retaking the nationwide test after the IT system was down for ten days. We find beneficial effects of testing across the student population. Disadvantaged schools were more likely to (re)take the test despite the crash, and their students gained more from being tested. Our results indicate that the core component in accountability systems, i.e. student testing, is beneficial even without the high stakes that are part of many accountability systems.

Effects of different types of true–false questions on memory awareness and long-term retention

This study investigated the effects of two different true–false questions on memory awareness and long-term retention of knowledge. Participants took four subsequent knowledge tests on curriculum learning material that they studied at different retention intervals prior to the start of this study (i.e. prior to the first test). At the first and fourth (pre- and post-) tests, participants indicated which form of memory awareness (i.e. remember, know, familiar and/or guess) accompanied their answer. On the two intermediate tests, testing format was manipulated: true/false or true/false justification, that is a true/false statement with the additional instruction to explain why the statement is true or false. The results resembled earlier findings in that different forms of memory awareness could be distinguished. The study did not indicate (additional) knowledge schematisation as a result of testing or testing format. However, independent of test format, the proportion of correct answers on the post-test was higher than on the pre-test. This could indicate that the beneficial effects of testing can occur even when the learning episode was at a long retention interval prior to the first test.

The public policy debate over newborn HIV testing: A case study of the knowledge enthymeme

This essay analyzes the web of persuasion named the “knowledge enthymeme”; in the public policy debate over mandatory newborn HIV testing in the United States and especially New York. Bringing together classical rhetorical theory and Foucault's theory of the knowledge‐power loop, the essay explains how the conceptual/argumentative frame of the knowledge enthymeme helped shape the knowledge‐power relations of mandatory newborn testing in dangerous ways. Ultimately, the knowledge enthymeme blocked more responsive approaches to testing by exaggerating the beneficial effects of testing and its knowledge, ignoring the contingenices of this knowledge, and bypassing the “situated knowledges “ of the women it targets.